I reorganized and sorted the office over the past few days. The before-and-after pictures are far less dramatic, mostly because I didn't take pictures of the inside of the file cabinet and such, but I can see a difference. At the very least, I won't have to worry about Mary tripping and falling into a box of random papers on her way to the bathroom.

So, the photos:

beforeafter

beforebeforeafter

beforeafter

beforeafter

See? Less intense. (And did you notice, I'm so underwhelmed by the transformation that I felt the need to label the befores and the afters this time?) But my sister once dislocated her elbow by tripping over a pillow and falling on a carpeted floor. My children have been taught a mantra: We have to be gentle with Mary. She's delicate.

We apply the same mantra to Mama, the cat, and most things in other people's houses.

The only other change I made, I forgot to take a before picture of... which is really too bad, because it was hilarious. The backstory is, I cannot keep a plant alive inside my house. It's really bad. People say this about themselves when they mean, can't keep a plant alive for more than a year, or can't keep a fancy high-maintenance orchid alive. No, no. I kill spider plants and aloe. Really.

So I had a dead spider plant in the corder of my living room, and it was just depressing. Not as creepy as a dead stuffed animal head, but bad enough that other spider plants are sitting around campfires telling stories about me right now.

I finally took mercy upon it, and dumped it into Emily's garden, where it might actually live for a while. And replaced it with this:

And now we wait for my family to return. Less than 18 hours until they are all back in their rightful place... and less than 24 before I start to wonder why it was I wanted all of these short, noisy people in my nice, clean house.

I knit. It's an obsession, and I am besotted. But I know not everyone is besotted, and this is not the right place to showcase my projects and, well, natter. So I've gathered up my knitting stuff and put it in its place. It's at http://knittingnattering.blogspot.com, and I'd love the company.